Brendan McCord is founder and Chair of the Cosmos Institute, an academy developing philosopher-builders to guide AI toward human flourishing. The institute launched in 2024, establishing the Human-Centered AI Lab at the University of Oxford along with fellowship and fast grants programs.
In the private sector, McCord was founding CEO of two AI startups acquired for $400 million, President of an AI lab within an investment holding company that returned billions to its investors, and President and executive team member leading data and AI for a 15,000-person company, the fastest-growing in history in its market.
In the public sector, McCord founded the first applied AI organization for the U.S. Department of Defense and authored its first AI strategy. He developed AI ethical principles with Secretary-level support and authored the first prototype for the CHIPS and Science Act. His career has taken him from the jungles of Zamboanga to the North Pole (610 days underwater) to the Pentagon, where he launched a project to use state-of-the-art imperfect information game-solving AI for military planning.
McCord teaches a graduate seminar on AI and philosophy at the University of Oxford, was a Visiting Fellow at St Catherine’s College, and serves on the Board of the Mercatus Center and Advisory Board of the Harvard Data Science Review. He holds degrees from MIT and Harvard Business School and writes and studies at the intersection of AI and philosophy.